Good to be back !

Well for any former regular readers, I can only apologise for the amount of time I have neglected my blog for !  I do love updating it but being busy at work, a six week holiday to New Zealand / Australia and a lack of winter fish have all meant that I've not been on here for a while and have been depriving all my fans of their regular match fishing update !

Anyway, Unsuprisingly I thought I'd restart my reporting with a match where I actually caught some fish.  The match in question was a Talk Angling League Match at Orchard Lake 6 which I'd managed to get in on at the last minute thanks to organiser Nick Roberts (thanks mate).  With the weather looking half decent for a change, Orchard Lake in Kent being a good venue full of F1's and the TA boys being a good bunch, I was looking forward to a few bites and a decent day out.

Plummers (my regular fishing mate and £1 donor) picked me up and as we travelled towards Kent the temperature varied from a balmy 1 degree to a distinctly cold Minus 4 (which was a bit worrying).  Having passed a number of small ponds / lakes on the journey to our Breakfast stop at the Blueboys Cafe none of them had any ice on them, so we weren't at all concerned.

However, arriving at the lake, we discovered that a lot of it was frozen over and we had to make a decision about which pegs to fish.  Luckily a lot of the frozen area was where we didn't usually peg although the usually productive back bank (Pegs 22-28) where frozen along with a few pegs either side of the spit.  Having sorted the pegging the pegs I fancied were 8,9,12,13 on the spit and although I'd never drawn there before, Pegs 36-44 on the left hand bank which were ice free and all had a blank peg either side.

Having watched most of my fancied pegs go, I came to draw with just two pegs left in the bag (Peg 13 and Peg 40) Squeeks (Stu Wilson) put in his hand and was like an over excited school boy as he drew Peg 13, an island peg where our mate Si had finished second from the previous match with 70lb (and he's rubbish !).

Arriving at my peg , I had Shedfull (Dave Speller) one side and Alex Barter the other.  Having been given some decent information regarding Orchard a few weeks before by Mark Murdoch, I basically followed that, which meant that I fished two short lines at 7 metres at 10 and 2 o'clock,  used the same rig for a longer line at 14 metres (which I would only fish if the other 2 lines stopped producing), and I also plumbed up an edge swim to my right about 4 metres along the bank and about a yard out in 3 foot of water.

The rigs for fishing "out" were 4x14 Scone berweemz (which I've been using a lot lately) with a spread bulk of No 8 shot with the final shot 7 inches from the hook.  Mark told me to try a rig with this sort of shotting at Orchard and I've never looked back since trying it.  The hook was a Size 16 Gamakatsu Pellet hook to 0.10 hooklength, and the elastic blue hydro.  On the whistle, one line was fed with a big ball of Swimstim natural GB and one with some dampened pellets.  Another top tip from Mark was not to feed your long line until 10 minutes before you wanted to fish it - so I didn't !  I think it is like any commerial fishery, if you feed a long line then it just stops the fish coming into your short line.  Well that is my theory anyway.

Although the match started slowly (not suprisingly following the nights minus temperatures)  the sun was shining, the wind was only light and I soon started to get the odd F1.  With the majority of my fish coming from the GB fed line I soon decided to feed some over the pellet line and was soon catching there as well.  Although the 10 o'clock line seemed a lot stronger, I would rest it every so often when I felt it was slowing, feed another ball of GB and nick a few fish off the other line.  I had started fishing 4mm expanders on the hook but having switched to a 6mm Marukyu and caught straight away on it, I stuck with them for the rest of the match.  With the float shotted right down to a dimple, the bites were still hard to spot especially when the wind got up but whilst some pegs faded in the afternoon, mine continued to fish and at the weigh in my 2 nets had almost identical weights in - one i used for the first half of the 5 hour match match and one for the second.  I had also been feeding the inside line with pelletts all day and when I saw Bob Murray catching at 4 metres on Peg 44 I thought I'd give it a quick go with 45 minutes remaining.  To be honest, I didn't expect to catch in the edge having been so cold and the water quite clear but within 20 seconds of laying my bait in part way up the shelf, the float disappeared and I had an F1.  Thinking it was just a fluke fish, I layed the rig in again and the same thing happened, again and again as the inside swim was solid and I wished I'd tried it earlier !

On the whistle I was playing my final fish and as the scales made their way round the lake, Sparky was winning with 66lb from Peg 8, John Rhodes had a 15lb beast on the feeder from Peg 26 and fortunately my two nets went 41 and 42lb for an 83lb top weight.

Result

Pikey..............Peg 40................83-0-0
Sparky............Peg 8..................66-7-0
Big Si............Peg 46.................54-8-0
Bob Murray...Peg 44.................54-4-0

So, all in all a lovely days fishing and one where I'd caught so well short that I didn't even have to try my 14 metre line, the company was also good and I look forward to fishing a few more match with the Talk Angling boys.

I'm at Greenridge Farm in Hampshire next and will take my camera this time to hopefully add a few shots to my next blog.  In the meantime I hope everyone catches a few fish and I 'll see some of you on the bank.